She stopped him.
"You are very much afraid of speaking plainly," she said. "Be more definite."
He flushed to the roots of his hair in his confusion and uneasiness. There was no way out of the difficulty.
"You have adopted such a manner with the world generally," he floundered, "that a concession from you means a great deal. You—you have been making extraordinary concessions. It is easy to see that this young fellow is madly enamored of you. He does not know how to conceal it, and he does not try. You have not seemed to demand that he should. You have let him follow you, and come and go as his passion and simplicity prompted him. One might say you had encouraged him—though encouraged seems hardly the word to use."
"No," she interrupted, "it is not the word to use."
"He has made himself conspicuous and you too, and you have never protested by word or deed. When he was in danger you actually risked your life for him."
"Great heaven!" she ejaculated.
The truth of what he said came upon her like a flash. Until this moment she had only seen the night from one stand-point, and to see it from this one was a deadly blow to her. She lost her balance.
"How dare you?" she cried breathlessly. "I was mad with excitement. If I had stopped to think——"
"You usually do stop to think," he put in. "That was why I was amazed. You did a thing without calculating its significance. You never did so before in your life. You know that it is true. You pride yourself upon it."